Lifelines

Okay, Fallingwater is going to have to wait just a few posts more because I wasn’t anticipating today’s activities and they’re too fun not to share!

Last week, we learned that CoCo Key Waterpark (out in Newark) is hosting FREE swim days from now until November 19 as long as you arrive between 3:00pm and 5:00pm.
Did you read what I just wrote?
FREE, I said!
We are not ones to let a good deal pass us by so I peeked at our schedule…and groaned.
There really wasn’t a terrific time for us to go because we have so much stuff going on!

We’d tentatively made plans with a few of our friends for yesterday evening but it ended up not working out for us. I knew tomorrow night would be bad so the only time left was today.
I was in a slight panic earlier because I realized it was Veteran’s Day and I was terrified that schools would be closed.
That actually happened to us at CoCo Key the first year we went–we’ve stayed at this resort twice.
Our dumb luck handed us TWO snow days for Newark City Schools, right on the days that we’d planned our family mid-week escape. (Mid-week! MID-WEEK! We were banking on it being deserted!)
It was hell on earth.
There were millions of people, tons of splashing, lines for slides.
Ugh.
But google told me that the good children of Newark (and Columbus) do NOT get Veterans Day off from school so I put the rest of the plan in action.

Charlie cleared his schedule and I spent the rest of the afternoon secretly packing for the waterpark.
The idea of surprising them was fun to me, but also I’ve learned not to utter a word about certain good timey things like this because if they don’t happen, like they didn’t yesterday, they aren’t crushed and I don’t feel like a wretched promise-breaker.
They had no idea we were ever planning to go so this was a TOTAL surprise to them.

I did hint towards a family field trip around 1:00 because I needed them to suit up so we could be on our way when Charlie arrived home. When I finally told them, they were jumping up and down and cutely high-fiving so I was really glad I kept it a secret all day. It was sweet to catch them unsuspecting and to be able to say…we’re spending the rest of the day SWIMMING!

We had a blast, the crowds weren’t bad at all (this coming from me, who can’t stand more than five people hovering near me at any given time), and WE DIDN’T SPEND A CENT! We stayed and played much longer than I had anticipated–arriving at 3:00, I figured we’d be done by 5:30. But it was 7:00 when we left! We hauled our own food in from Panera (that’s our “fast food”) and ate out in the lobby area so that gave them enough stamina to forge on ahead with more fantastic fun!

Our kids are great about finding us when they’re “done.” We didn’t see the boys at all the almost the entire time we were there! That was a little weird to me as this is the first time they’ve really branched out on their own so much. I missed them and all the laughs they were having! But the Littles kept us busy and we shared some giggles ourselves watching Creux come flying down the slide 15,678 times.

I’d brought along their jammies and shampoo (thanks for the reminder, Carla!) so we were able to shower them in the locker room and get them situated for bed before the short drive home.
Which ended up being a good thing because we’re TIRED!

We’re going to try and make it one more time next week before the free admission offer expires! If you have time, you should pop by there. It’s super family-friendly and clean and there’s gobs for everyone to do!
Plus it’s free.
FREE!
So just go :)
(Look at me all strong-arming you into fun!)

The first half of our night:

I snatched these two IMMEDIATELY because I knew I’d never see them again.
I was very nearly correct.

“What in the WORLD???”

I believe this is what we call “weighing the pros and cons.”

Over-whelmed melt-down :)

“I help you.”

Here she seems like she’s the wonderful big sister, offering encouragement, as if she’s telling him that it’s ok to go.
And she is.
But she wants HIM to go first so she can see what happens to him! :)

We girls stuck together all night long.
As it turns out, neither of us is a fan of waterslides and we both LOVE the “warm pool.” (Which is like a hot tub for families. Meaning your skin will not melt off when you enter into it. Bonus, eh?)

These little fountain things kept him busy long enough to have me considering where I could stick one in my house. I didn’t come up with anything concrete but I’m not exactly throwing in the towel on the idea.

Off to the bitty slides!

A shot of the treehouse play area:

This did not end well.

That’s Rhyse under that bucketful of water!

Trying out the REAL bitty slides in the baby area. Oddly, this has a death-drop right at the end where, if you don’t immediately catch them, they sink to the bottom and you scar them for life. The OTHER slide, the one in the treehouse area doesn’t have this neat little life-risking feature. The slide just SAFELY bottoms out.

So, with that previous caption in mind, you can pretty well guess what happened here.
A.) She is CLEARLY terrified
B.) I had to choose between my camera sinking or my daughter. My head is hanging. But at least I got this great shot!!!! ;)

This, for the record, did not end well either.
In fact, I think it would be fair to say, it ended the WORST.

HAHA! I caught one!

These…

…belong to him.

A spotting! A spotting!
I’m telling you, I saw them maybe ten minutes total over the whole three hours we were there so I was REALLY excited when I caught a sight of one of my bigger boys.

And suddenly, they were gone again. Sigh.

We had big plans of our own though–the “warm pool.”
Honestly, Greer could’ve stayed here all night long.
And Jenny, this strangely felt like your pool. You must CRANK the heat in that baby! (Which I love, by the way. I’ve never shivered, not ever, in your pool. Tell Kevin I said thanks for letting you spend a million dollars on my comfort :))

That was a lot of pictures, huh?
Am just warming up, folks.
Creux discovered the slide and all of it’s fantastically fun features and, lucky me, I managed to capture some extremely adorable “I can’t believe this is happening to me!” moments.
He’s just delectable, I must say.
He’s ornery as all get out but good grief, I just love that zany baby to BITS!

Fun, fun, fun family night.
Loved it, every moment.

3 Responses to “Family Field Trip!”

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